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8/1/2012 1:57PM

Retailers Text to Reach Young Customers

Teens don't email. So some fashion brands are using text messaging as a faster, surer way to teens' hearts and wallets. Brands like Vans and Charlotte Russe are finding that teens respond to marketing texts with alacrity and with far higher response rates than other methods, as Christina Binkley explains on Lunch Break. Photo: Misty Keasler for The Wall Street Journal.

This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.

... I ... me the ... team's enticing them with ... coupons and deals but ... when a mom and dad need to know about all this Chris Binkley is can explain she is ... right here on Lunch Break high Chris so ... sixteen is this because and most of the other teams and I know they don't care bout you know young people they bait and texting is the way they communicate is that what these returns are going after them there ... that is exactly why it has been one of the early retailers to get into this charlatan race of the fashion brand for teens and twenty somethings ... couple years ago noticed that ... the kids that they were wanting a market to work on e mail at all that they were standing in their stores texting back and forth one in the dressing room in one out ... so they started a whole texting program based on this and the things that notices seventy seven like an announcement about you know by X amount maybe get a free pair of sunglasses and so with that they ... would be on that right they send videos even which the good news is I guess when you tax it doesn't count for a data plan ... that's right that ... that is absolute the next frontier of texting or you can text videos and photos now ... so let's do that with photos of our family is that marketers are using that to to really reach out to customers ... is that quite um quite humorous and fun video that Sherlund respects it's it's it's teen girls last year for back to school promotion to have that very handsome young man has been very Cretaceous ... as the operas of a five dollar up on ... Bloomingdales bans this on the other stores and brands trying this ... out with ... the click through rate in just a minute then very quickly the privacy issue now some parents might planted the idea of retailers having the phone numbers of their children ... but in truth he spoke to some people actually say ... there's there are fewer privacy issues involved in with the male in some cases why is that ... well that you know it's regulation ... these texts are being E-mail the irony being there and text are being regulated by the telecom industry ... and on and that means that you have to opt in to receive them so when you're walking through mall you may start to notice signs asking people ... to text a word to the short code of numbers ... thats an opt in saying I want to receive texts on this line so parents ... need to keep track of course of the other kids are using their cellphones and when there when they're texting in for that ... because once they've opted in that signing a permission slip success of a halving in terms of return ... a huge they have almost a one hundred percent read ... of the text e mail and text better sense ... of ... the e mails are being read or under ten percent so it so that the matter the difference between reading your marketing message through via text ... or e mail